As Keir Starmer and his cabinet try to keep control at the wheel it’s like watching the slowest car crash in political history. In scenes reminiscent of a Bond movie, we watch as the Mini that is the Labour government steers head-on towards the juggernaut of political meltdown.

Not that this collision comes as much of a surprise. The woeful mismanagement of changes to the welfare system has confirmed what many of us have suspected ever since Starmer axed the winter fuel allowance shortly after coming into office. When this was followed months later by a concessionary U-turn – the result, we were asked to believe, of discovering that the exchequer’s finances were less dire than anticipated – it became clear how little this government’s judgement can be relied upon.

Showing a talent for U-turns that would shame Torvill and Dean, this is an administration that doesn’t have a clue about how to govern or balance the books. Thanks to a disastrous week at Westminster, the cost of welfare, far from being reduced, will now be even higher. So how is the Chancellor going to fill the yawning financial hole that has opened up beneath the country’s feet?

Doubtless there will be a smorgasbord of unpalatable solutions, among them higher taxation and spending cuts. Thus, within 12 months of coming to power, a party already struggling for authority and respect appears doomed to losing the confidence of a large swathe of the electorate.

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